PGA event ‘moonshot’ for Japan
TOKYO: The PGA Tour will hold its first official tournament in Japan. And the main sponsor of next year’s event, Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa, is describing it as a kind of “moonshot’’ for golf in his country. Maezawa should know.
The founder of the Japanese fashion website Zozotown, Maezawa was announced earlier this year as the first commercial passenger to attempt a flight around the moon.
“I think this will be the first PGA Tour sponsor that is going to the moon,’’ he said through an interpreter yesterday in announcing the tournament.
“I haven’t decided who I will take to the moon with me yet. I would like to talk to many people with an open mind.’’
Japanese golfer Hideki Matsuyama was sitting alongside Maezawa during the media event at a central Tokyo hotel.
“I don’t know whether he will ask me, but I would love to go [to the moon],’’
Matsuyama said.
The tournament, set for Oct 24-27, will be part of the PGA’s swing through Asia along with stops in South Korea and China. The Japanese tournament replaces one in Malaysia. The PGA Tour said it was a sixyear deal.
PGA Tour officials said the Zozo Championship will have a purse of US$9.75
million with a field of 78 plus 10 designated by the Japanese Golf Tour, and eight others with special exemptions. It will be played at the Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club in Chiba prefecture, just outside Tokyo.
Maezawa said he was a “five-handicap’’ golfer at his best, but said he may have slipped to a nine-handicap — also a high level for an amateur player.